“It’s one of the casitas, the amphibian one. Maxime said something about the pump being on the fritz.”
“Shit, that’s not good. Is it currently occupied?”
Zee shrugged. “Beats me. I'm just the messenger, and I gotta get back to the kitchen.”
“All right. Thanks for coming to get me. I’m sorry about the phone.”
An arm whipped around my neck and pulled me to him. Zee rubbed the top of my head, likely making my shaggy hair even messier, but I appreciated the familiar action that displaced some of the weirdness between us. “Later, yeah? And then you’ll tell me about ordering a vegetarian meal to your room.”
My eyes rounded, and my cheeks flushed. Of course, he would have noticed that; it wasn’t something I wouldeverorder for myself. “Okay.”
“If you're finally ready for the birds and the bees talk, I've been practicing. It'll be epic, like your own personalTed Talk,with charts and graphs and everything.” That playful smirk of his returned, and while the idea was mortifying, I much preferred his teasing to hearing the hurt in his voice.
We parted ways at the dining hall, and I picked up my pace to figure out how bad the situation was. When Maxime saw me, I could see the relief in his expression. He was talking to a frantic customer and indicated for me to join them.
“Here he is now. This is Rudolph. He’s our head of maintenance. He will take care of it straight away. I do apologize for the temporary displacement.”
Maxime ushered the woman to a seat in the lounge, and when he returned to me, he spoke in a hushed tone. “The Land and Sea Suite. Our guests are freshwater only, and the pump got reversed somehow, bringing in water from the salted tank instead. Luckily, she noticed before her kids went into the water, or it could have been disastrous. Please tell me you can fix it.”
“I should be able to if I can find where or how the pump glitched.” Under Maxime’s intent stare, I added, “Yes. Yes, absolutely, I can.”
He gave an approving nod at my answer. “Good. Thank you. Best get to it.”
I hurried toward the casitas and the tool shed near them. Some of the units required specialized equipment,and it was easier to keep them nearby instead of having to haul them in each time. Each of the casitas offered unique environments and options to cater to different needs. The Land and Sea Suite was designed for beings that needed to be in water more frequently than trips to the pool. Half of the small cottage was dry with a bed and furniture, but the floor sloped down into a pool for easy entrance and exiting in any form. We designed a system that would allow us to set it up for freshwater, saltwater, or even brackish, depending on the guest.
Other casitas included the Wind and Air suite, which had a retractable roof for flyers, the Fire and Ice Suite, which allowed for temperature control, and then we had some with different climates and humidity levels to suit tropical or desert dwellers.
It had been one of the biggest challenges when we were building the place, but it was an important part of what we were doing here, to allow options for those who couldn’t usually travel due to their unique needs. I’d had to figure out how to maintain all the equipment used to create these special environments; there were no manuals or specialists to call in.
At the rear of the suite in question was the pumphouse that held the pump and filtration system we used. I spent the next hour or so tracing every part and every pipe to find the problem. It ended up being a simple blockage, thankfully. Once I found and fixed the water flow issue, I drained the indoor pool, making sure every lastdrop was gone, and refilled it with freshwater. With a test kit, I checked the salinity to ensure it was at the right levels and snapped a picture to send to Maxime.
Me: Land and Sea is fixed and all good to go.
Maxime: Well done, friend. I’m sure our guests will be happy to hear that.
Pride made my heart swell, and my first thought was about wanting to tell Bowen. Maybe being a handyman wasn’t saving the world, but I had a hand in saving the vacation of a family staying here. It had only been a couple hours since we’d been together, and already I couldn’t wait to see him again.
Maxime: Rudolph?
Me: Yeah?
Maxime: Do come in and see me. I think we need to have a chat.
Shit. First Zee, now him. It looked like I had a lot ofchattingahead of me, and not with the person I wanted it to be. Though I owed them both an explanation for having my phone off and for how I’d been acting—not that I fully understood it myself—except the need I had to be near Bowen overwhelmed almost everything else.
Me: Okay.
When I returned to the lobby, it was a similar situation to the one the other day.Great. Everyone’s here. I was really hoping for one-on-one conversations and not having to discuss my whatever it was withBowen with everyone. Well, might as well pull off the Band-Aid.
Assuming Kieran had done his privacy thing again, I tucked my hands into my pockets and began talking as I walked to the empty chair. “Listen, I’m really sorry I turned my phone off. It was a one-time thing. Aren’t I entitled to a little break?”
Zee, surprisingly, offered me a sympathetic look. “It’s not that, Wolfie. Well, not entirely.”
Maxime dipped his head. “You are more than entitled to a break, however you see fit and withwhomeveryou choose to share it, until either of those things endangers us or our guests.”
I sat up straight in my chair, my wolf prickling from within. “If you mean Bowen, he’s not a danger to anyone, I swear.”
“Rudolph,” the gentle tone Maxime used might as well have been a shout for the way it pressed in on me. “You told him what I was.”
